From Hollywood To Broadway

Ed Bradley Talks To Actor Denzel Washington

(CBS)  "I heard you make that kind of money, too," says Washington, laughing.

"I'm not there yet," says Bradley.

In 2002, in the film, "Antwone Fisher," Washington played a Navy psychiatrist counseling a troubled sailor. He was also the film's director.

Did he enjoy directing? "Absolutely," says Washington. "I'm going to do it again."

Does he prefer acting to directing, or does he like to do both? "I look at Clint Eastwood as the model," says Washington. "I like the way he's doing things. And that's how I'd like to do it. Just segue right into more and more filmmaking."

A Hollywood director's chair is a long way from where Washington grew up, in Mount Vernon, a working-class suburb outside New York City. His mother, Lennis, managed a beauty shop, and his father, Denzel Sr., was a Pentecostal preacher who held down two other jobs.

Washington went to church every Sunday, but dreamed of becoming a professional athlete. He says he spent all of his free time at what was then the Boys Club: "I lived here. My mother would have to come get me."

"So you had a time when you had to come home?" asks Bradley.

"9 p.m., man. I had it all timed," says Washington. "I knew how to get to the fish market by 8:54 p.m., and by the chicken joint by 8:56 p.m., in order to make it home by 9 p.m."

Did his mother ever have to come looking for him? "She did. She would. We were in the park and she came. And they were like, 'Aw, De, your mom's here.' And I got in the car. And she was screaming," recalls Washington. "So I kind of look at everybody out the window, like, you know, 'I got this.' As I was turning around, 'Pow.' So I put my head under the dashboard. 'Just drive, ma, just drive.'"

Washington says his mother saved his life when she scraped together enough money to send him to Oakland Academy, a small boarding school for boys in upstate New York. He hadn't been back there for 20 years, and was surprised to see his old school being converted into condominiums.

"Man, it looks so little now," says Washington. "My God."

Washington was 14 when he attended Oakland Academy, and he was only one of a handful of African-American students. How did he end up there?

"I was in public school, Mount Vernon High School, and my mother decided it was best to get me out of there before I ended up where a lot of my friends are now -- you know, in the grave, in the penitentiary," says Washington.